Joe Bottiglieri could have been a coach in the NFL. In fact, he remains friends with current head coaches in the league, such as Dan Quinn, Mike Tomlin and Sean McDermott.
Bottiliglieri coached with Dan Quinn at William & Mary, and Quinn, who is currently the head coach of the Washington Commanders, once asked Bottiglieri to join him at Hofstra.
“He was the defensive line coach at Hofstra after he had been with us at William & Mary in his first job,” Bottiglieri said. “He had played at Salisbury [Maryland] State, whose head coach at the time was one of my former assistants, so there was a connection there. And he got hired at William & Mary as a defensive line coach along with Mike London. He then went to Hofstra two years later, while I was at Lehigh at the time, and we just went 12-1 [in 1998] and beat Richmond in the first round of the playoffs and then lost to UMass, which went on to win the FCS national championship.
“Dan called me and wanted me to come to Hofstra as the defensive coordinator. He said I had to take this job, but I had just returned to the Lehigh Valley and was getting settled in at Lehigh with Kevin Higgins. He lobbied for me and said the job was mine if I wanted it because we really did have a great rapport. But I decided to stay at Lehigh.”
Who knows if going with Quinn some 27 years ago might have led Bottiglieri to a position in the NFL?
But Bottiglieri has no regrets about not going pro.
He spent 53 seasons coaching college and high school football, much of it in the Lehigh Valley, including the last two seasons as defensive coordinator at Liberty.
But after 53 years on the sidelines — 36 in college football and 17 in high school — Bottiglieri has announced his retirement.
It’s not that he doesn’t still enjoy the game or working with kids.
Joe Bottiglieri, seen working with Lehigh football players during his time as the Mountain Hawks’ defensive coordinator, has retired after 53 seasons as a football coach. He most recently was the defensive coordinator at Liberty. (Lehigh University/contributed photo)
But the 1966 Easton High School graduate, who began his coaching career at Lafayette under Neil Putnam in 1973, just feels it’s time to do some other things and watch some of his grandkids play, like Allentown Central Catholic’s Grayson Schmell, who made his mark as a sophomore this past season.
Liberty head coach Shawn Daignault said Bottiglieri has forgotten more about football than most coaches will ever know and said he was a great part of the coaching staff the last two seasons when Liberty went 7-4 and 8-4 after winning just five games over the previous three seasons.
Bottiglieri enjoyed the people he worked with on the Hurricanes staff and the players as well.
“We had so much fun and it was so enjoyable to coach at Liberty the last two years and this year we had a great group of seniors,” Bottiglieri said. “Jake Pukszyn was phenomenal. He’s just a special player. He would be getting double-teamed and Antonio Fontanez, our quarterback, would still throw the ball to him and we’d say ‘Oh no.’ But Jake would still go up and get it. He’s just a fantastic receiver and he also did a good job on defense when we needed him because of some injuries.
“We just had great players, great kids and this was the first time in 15 years that Liberty beat both Bethlehem Catholic and Freedom in the same season. The city championship is a big deal.”
Bottiglieri also complimented Daignault and the rest of the coaches.
“Shawn has done a great job of getting that program turned around, and I think that’s going to continue,” he said. “They are going to be relevant every year now. Frankie Lane, being the offensive coordinator, led to some great practices that were a lot of fun because we’d get on each other and kid around. Defensively, Levi Brown, who is a Liberty legend, was with us, and so were Anthony Orlando and RJ Guffy. What was interesting was that we had five former Easton players on that staff, including me. Easton grads outnumbered the Liberty grads, and we’d kid them about that, too.”
Of course, it was Easton that beat Liberty twice, including in the District 11 6A semifinals.
“They were the best team we played,” Bottiglieri said. “In fact, I would have loved to see Easton play Harrisburg because I believe Easton was the best public school team in Pennsylvania. It’s just unfortunate that there’s such an imbalance between the public and private schools at that level.”
That’s something Bottiglieri, like many others, would like to see changed.
“I can understand parents who live in that area who have sons and daughters who are tremendous athletes wanting to send their kids to the best possible situation,” he said. “Places such as La Salle College High School, St. Joe’s Prep, Malvern Prep and so on. That’s great. But when it comes to state playoffs, let’s keep them separate.
“Those kids go to those schools because they’re going to get great exposure, and have a chance to go to the next level. Wonderful. But let’s separate them and have a public and private school champion.”
Joe Bottiglieri said he has retired after 53 seasons as a football coach. Bottiglieri went 70-51 as the head coach at Emmaus over 11 seasons from 2002-2012. Most recently, he was the defensive coordinator at Liberty. (Alen Beljin/Chronicles)
Bottiglieri said that the biggest change he has seen with high school kids is that the focus for many of them and their parents is getting to the next level.
“It’s so much on their mind, more so than years ago, and it’s almost like ‘Coach, I want to do [this and that]’ because they want to get to the next level instead of worrying about what’s going on right now with our team and at Liberty,” Bottiglieri said. “I’d tell them not to focus on the next level, focus on the next game, and what we have to do to be ready. That’s the biggest difference I’ve seen with kids today as opposed to 15 or 20 years. But the kids are still great. They’re still competitive.”
The good experiences far outweighed the bad as Bottiglieri was the head coach at both Mansfield and Shippensburg and had stops at Rhode Island, Wesley, and Moravian in addition to Lafayette, Lehigh and William & Mary. He was also the head coach at Allentown Central Catholic for one season and at Emmaus for 11 where he turned around a doormat program.
“They say you’re going to know when it’s time to retire, and that’s the way it was for me this year,” Bottiglieri said. “I will still try to stay involved and do some consulting wherever I can, but the day-to-day stuff and the offseason weight program were getting to be too much, and there are some other things I want to do with my time.
“Without sounding corny, there’s nothing better on a fall Friday night than hearing that Liberty band play and the kids running out onto the field. It sends chills up and down your spine. There’s nothing like Friday night football, especially here in the Lehigh Valley where football is so big. All of those years, 36 in college and 17 years in high school, and for me, the more enjoyable years for me were at the high school level. It’s just tremendous to see these kids go out and have a great time.
“I wasn’t big on pregame speeches,” he added. “We’d go over what we had to do and then I would just say ‘Guys, I am excited to go out and see you perform tonight.’ That’s what made it so exciting.”